Hunter Biden’s increasingly famous “sugar brother” Kevin Morris testified before the House Oversight Committee yesterday in what turned out to be a rather lackluster chapter in the unfolding saga of Biden Inc. Morris was there as part of the impeachment probe into Joe Biden, but it wasn’t entirely clear what the Republicans were expecting him to say. Morris admitted to virtually everything that we’ve heard about his relationship with the First Son but seemed baffled about why he was there. James Comer suggested that there were inappropriate connections between “loans” that Morris had made to Hunter and Joe Biden’s political campaigns, but little to no concrete evidence was provided. The Oversight Committee has provided plenty of fireworks over the course of this investigation, but this chapter seemed to be more of a dud than anything else. (Messenger)
House Republicans on Thursday argued that Kevin Morris, a Hunter Biden associate, helped the presidential campaign of Joe Biden by loaning the president’s son money to help him pay off a tax bill.
Morris, who testified in the impeachment probe on Thursday, told lawmakers that he loaned Hunter Biden around $5 million, according to a source familiar with the interview. Morris also told investigators that his loan to Hunter Biden, his personal friend, had nothing to do with politics.
The scrutiny of Morris on Thursday marks a journey down one of the deepest rabbit holes in the GOP’s impeachment investigation into the president. While Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., tried to draw a connection between Morris’ loans and the White House, the witness himself poured cold water on the idea that he acted to benefit the Biden campaign.
Kevin Morris has emerged as one of the more colorful and potentially interesting characters in the story of Biden Incorporated, but his involvement with the Biden family’s affairs has always sounded very “hands-off” in nature. I suppose it was worth talking to him, but I’ll confess that I really wasn’t sure what, if anything, he could be accused of. He’s been on the periphery of the story and is definitely deeply embedded with the Bidens, but he never seems to show up in the truly insidious parts of the story.
Morris is a wealthy Hollywood attorney and a big Democratic supporter. He only met Hunter for the first time in 2019, but he claims to look upon him as “a brother.” He freely admitted that he “loaned” at least $5 million to Hunter and told the committee that he still expects that loan to be repaid at some point. We see a lot of these types of “loans” taking place around the Bidens, but if the loans are made informally between friends, there’s not much legal maneuvering room to claim that a crime has taken place even if the loans never wind up being repaid.
Morris has also donated to Joe Biden’s campaigns, but no evidence has been brought forth suggesting that the funds exceeded campaign finance law limits. Morris claims with a straight face that he never asked for or received any favors from the Bidens. Comer tried to describe Hunter’s tax evasion charges as a “problem” for Biden’s presidential campaign and that the money Morris gave Hunter was a way to make that problem “go away.”
Fair enough. That’s obviously how the situation played out in reality. But Morris denies ever having even spoken to Joe Biden and no proof has been presented that he did. The money was a gift to a “friend” who was in trouble. Whether or not that benefitted Biden’s presidential campaign does not appear to be on the shoulders of Kevin Morriss provided the money all went to the IRS to cover Hunter’s delinquent taxes, which it apparently did.
Is there something dubious going on under the covers? Almost certainly. Nobody simply gives that kind of money away without a reason. But Kevin Morris may simply have been greasing the skids with a powerful political family in the event that he needed some sort of favor in the future. Such things happen among the wealthy and politically connected class. But Comer’s committee has yet to show us a smoking gun. Morris had no known connection to Burisma or the Chinese energy firm that the Bidens cashed in on so richly. He doesn’t really even show up in Hunter’s infamous laptop because he reportedly didn’t meet him until shortly after he’d gotten sober. At least for now, Kevin Morris appears to be a dry well in terms of the investigation into the affairs of Biden Inc.